S06E01 | Doing Recovery in the 21st Century: A Journey Through the Archives and Beyond

C19: America in the 19th Century

Certain texts and writers have been allotted attention and resources in the study of American literature, while others remain understudied and sometimes even unknown. The efforts of literary recovery seek to make available lesser-known texts by exploring the archives and doing different kinds of editorial work. How might such recovery efforts materialize in the form of book editions, anthologies, or digital archives? What kinds of editorial decisions do scholars make in the process of curating recovered texts? In this episode of the C19 Podcast, Stephanie Peebles Tavera (Texas A&M University) guides listeners through her first experience of archival and recovery work from encountering manuscripts at the American Jewish Archives during dissertation research to curating a book edition of Annie Nathan Meyer’s Helen Brent, M.D. (1892) to involving her graduate students in contributing to digital archives. Along the way, Tavera interviews colleagues whose ongoing efforts continue to shape the field of American women’s literature, including Dana Herman (Jacob Rader Marcus Center), Lori Harrison-Kahan (Boston College), Brigitte Fielder (University of Wisconsin-Madison), and Mary Chapman (University of British Columbia). These conversations cover a wide range of subjects such as discovering the unexpected; doing archival work in pandemic times; understanding the “hidden archive”; and using physical archival materials, print book editions, and digital anthologies in the classroom. Production assistance by DeLisa Hawkes (University of Tennessee-Knoxville). Post production support provided by Rachel Boccio (LaGuardia Community College/CUNY) and Ashley Rattner (Jacksonville State University). Transcript is available at http://bit.ly/3Yayxg4